Tuesday, April 29, 2008

An American Poets Song Book

I pulled this record out of my father's collection. I pulled it out cause I'd never seen it before in any of my travels and it looked interesting. And when I flipped it over I saw that it was inscribed to my pops from the dude who made the record.

My father's name is Larry Cox. He's a good man. He spent his whole life fighting for Human Rights and Social Justice. I admire him greatly.

The inscription is dated march 1976. Back then my pop's was doing a radio program on WBAI called "taking it easy, but taking it". Political stuff and music and revolution. You know.

The way he arranges the singing of "Away", which is a Robert Frost joint, is so weird and beautiful that I had to share it. I'm also posting one of the Paul Lawrence Dunbar songs. He was a was a seminal American poet of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Of course I had never heard of him because the teaching of accomplishments by black Americans, at least when I was a kid, was not really a priority in the New York City public school system. It was a quick Langston Hughes joint in February and then it was like: move on.